Relations between the Royal Navy and NATO have ‘never been closer’ as the alliance marks 74 years since its creation this month amid continued global instability. British warships spent nearly 10,000 hours – 60 weeks – on NATO operations in 2022 and that pace has continued unabated in the first four months of 2023.
The Royal Navy's only ice patrol HMS Protector has left the Falkland Islands on her way back to Plymouth after four of Antarctic work. It will be a 6,000-mile journey for maintenance and training after completing her season last month safeguarding birdlife and laying the groundwork for further research in the years to come protecting wildlife, safeguarding birdlife, and leaving behind special markers.
The Royal Navy's HMS Ambuscade is to be preserved as a shipbuilding museum in Glasgow following her decommissioning by the Pakistan Navy, it was announced this week.
The British Forces South Atlantic Command this week welcomed the arrival of HMS Medway at Mare Harbor. HMS Medway is a Batch 2 River class offshore patrol vessel, currently commissioned and since 2019 assigned long-term as Royal Navy guard ship in the Caribbean.
Sailors from the Royal Navy's Ice Patrol Ship continued their tour of impressive football pitches (starting with Grytviken in South Georgia), when they kicked off inside the Antarctic Circle.
A specialist ship bought to support Royal Navy mine-hunting operations – a mother ship to launch drones to find and destroy undersea threats – has arrived in Plymouth. When deployed, the platform will support the safeguarding of UK waters from the threat of mines at sea, operating a range of uncrewed systems that will help keep personnel at a safe distance.
Construction is underway on the second Type 31 frigate being built for the Royal Navy. The first steel has been cut on HMS Active at the Babcock shipyard in Fife, by Defense Minister Alex Chalk.
Sailors from the Royal Navy went head to head with British Antarctic Survey staff during a game of football on the most southerly – and arguably the worst – pitch in the world. The playing field, at Grytviken, the largest settlement of South Georgia Island, in the South Atlantic, is billed as the most southerly in the world, some 2,476 miles from the South Pole, to be precise.
Royal Navy personnel are helping scientists warn of potentially catastrophic tsunamis by researching huge underwater volcanoes on the edge of Antarctica. Navy icebreaker HMS Protector has used her state-of-the-art sensors to scan peaks in the South Sandwich Islands – one of the world’s most remote territories.
The Royal Air Force played a significant role in helping to secure Britain's recapture of the Falkland Islands in 1982 with its aircraft supporting UK forces during many operations. On the fortieth anniversary of the conflict, Forces.net reveals some of the details.